@cowovettcramelliottfarahbannistergeorge
"You come across as the emotionally stunted child actually with your constant personal insults. O.K, I've belittled your hero but there's no need to resort to playground language. Further, the integrity of a poster who chooses a virtually admitted drug cheat as his hero has to be a little suspect, so I'm not going to take any lessons from you.
Yes, I know what a mile is, it was a typo. Grow up please.
Maybe the two mile WR was relatively weak. So why did Aouita only manage to shave 0.06 seconds off it in a paced all out attempt on it nearly 10 years later? The Ovett/Rono race wasn't a WR attempt it was a race, and neither were at their peak for that season.Ovett certainly was capable of a lot faster evidently. Aouita was running the 10K in 1987, whereas Ovett was defeating the new 800m superstar Coe in the European Championships. Two miles was the perfect distance for Aouita in 86 and 87 yet be barely beat Ovett's race time.
Yeah I know nearly all the greats from the 70's and 80's suffered terrible injuries when at the peak of their powers....well except Aouita - starting a trend that lasts to this day for Africans to have quite astonishing staying power and abilities to avoid injuries.
Really, you could make the case that Aouita is the most reprehensible character in track and field history, if he indeed did take PEDs. There's no absolute proof he did, but his encouragement of Australian athlete's to take them, along with the advice that 'everybody does', really does warrant the assumption that he did cheat. And if Aouita was the first in a long line of African drug cheats, who normalized the use of PEDs and began an era of cheating that has almost brought down Track and Field as a legitimate sport then I hope there's a place in hell for him."
I have already written a longer answer to this new nonsens which was not published (or deleted?). So in short:
For what ever reason do you want to show that Ovett was the better long distance runner than Henry Rono or Said Aouita? He wasn't. Others have given you some infos already.
The 2 Miles was not "maybe relatively weak". It was by far the weakest distance record in the late 70s/early80s. Can you please give me your infos about Aouita's "paced all out attempt" in which he only was capable of running 8:13.45? It seems you have seen the race. I havn't (just last 50 meters or so) so I would be very interested for any info which you can give. Aouita was the first under 7:30 (something like 8:03 2 Miles) and under 13:00. Times which Ovett difinitely was not capable to run. Why are you so focusing on this defeat of Rono? It was a great achievement from Ovett, no doubt. But in a perfect race for him. Little bit faster and he would have blown up, as shown on many other occasions. And he was not always "jogging" as many on this forum always claim. He always was flat out as you can see on the various videos of the races (I have close to 100 in my collection). He just was still capable of his famous finish and made it look relatively easy (which it not was). Maybe in perfectly paced races in around 1980 he was capable of little bit faster than 7:40 and 13:15. But not anywhere near a Rono or Aouita.
Just for your info: I have this name in all athletics forums where I occasionally post for more than 15 years. Coe and Cram are good friends of Aouita. What does this tell about your heros? And I much more like the person Ovett than the person Aouita. But to deny facts for some strange agenda (what ever it is) is dangerous.
OK, your hero is the 1978 European 800m champion. As well as the 1980 Olympic 1500m silver medalist, right? Maybe we just should claryfy that Ovett has won everything (if not for Coe). People who have beaten him don't count. If he wasn't there, well, but if, he definitely would... And Coe, Cram , Elliott easily would have won the double in Seoul if... (OK, many ifs but still...). But maybe you can enlighten me in which order these three would have won the 3 medals in both events if just in normal shape?
Aouita didn't had injury problems, ...well that's on a level to your other "typos".
And since Aouita was a product of the doping culture of North Africa (whereas in Britain something bad like this was not known about at all) you maybe can inform me about this little bit. Late 1970s - where was this doping-centre of Morocco? (just an info for you: they didn't had a single runner of international class when Aouita started slowly to go ahead in the rankings).
But we are out of topic. So, since the topic is Rono's '78 season by the numbers, so I will add a few numbers from my site:
http://thegreatdistancerunners.de/HenryRono.html
Maybe it should be made more clear, that the greatest long distance runner of 1978 in fact was Ovett, who has beaten Rono once.